


Our Plastic Pals

by MiladyDragon



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Action Figures, Crack, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-04
Updated: 2012-09-04
Packaged: 2017-11-13 13:51:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/504188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiladyDragon/pseuds/MiladyDragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Owen discovers something very strange in Jack's office.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Our Plastic Pals

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the Jantocam challenge on LJ. The title comes from "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"

 

Owen Harper was in the Hub at the ungodly hour of ‘oh dark thirty’, as his best mate in Uni often put it.

He’d never even consider coming in that early – meaning, before the sun came up – if it weren’t for Jack and that damned report.  Jack was insisting that Owen have it done today, while Owen had tried to convince him there was no hurry…after all, the alien had been dead when it had been dumped by the Rift into the lobby of the St. David’s.  Was it his fault that some sort of minor foreign dignitary had been splattered by unknown slime as it hit the expensive carpet? 

Of course not!

But apparently the Queen was demanding an explanation, and so Owen had gotten a call as he was picking up this gorgeous bird last night, with Jack giving him hell for not finishing the report in a timely matter. 

And so, Owen found himself in a darkened Hub way too early in the morning to actually function.  What was worse, was there was no Tea Boy in sight to make him coffee.

Owen powered up the Hub, glaring toward Jack’s office.  Sod ‘em both…if he had to be there, then bloody Ianto could stop shagging Jack long enough to get him a coffee.

He stomped as loud as he could toward the dark office, a small part of him feeling like he was a kid having a strop at a parent who had unjustifiably disciplined him.  The larger part of him didn’t care, because Harkness couldn’t bother to use his bragged about charm on the Queen to get her to shut up about the stupid dignitary.  After all, they’d Retconned the man.  What difference did it make when the report was turned in?  Besides, they were supposed to be above the government! 

If Owen had to admit it – and he wasn’t about to – he’d been damned lazy about getting it done.  It was boring.  He had better things to do, although when he thought about what those were, nothing came to mind. 

He strode into the office, flipping the light on.  There was no sign that anyone had been in there since the night before, and Jack’s hatch was open.  Owen didn’t really want to look down there, but he wanted caffeine, damn it! 

There was no one down in Jack’s bunk.

It looked like he was alone in the Hub.

Fuck!

He turned away from the hole in the floor, cursing his bad luck.  Jack and Ianto must have gone to the Tea Boy’s flat, which meant Owen wasn’t getting a damned thing unless he made it himself...or went back out again. 

There was no way he was doing any sort of sodding report without a boost.  Maybe a couple of pastries, too.

Owen was just leaving when something on Jack’s desk caught his attention.

The medic moved closer, smirking.  There were two action figures on the blotter, and Owen laughed.  Since when did Jack play with dolls?

But there was something about these action figures that bothered Owen.  Was it has imagination, or did they look just like Harkness and the Tea Boy?

He sat down in Jack’s chair, the better to see the two plastic toys.  The one was wearing Jack’s trademark clothes except for the coat, even including his wrist strap.  The second one had on a familiar-looking suit, and red shirt.

Hell…the figures _were_ Jack and Ianto!  They had to be!

Christ, what was he going to do?

 

**********

 

“There are definite traces of Rift energy,” Tosh reported.

Owen had called the girls in, of course; after all, misery loves company.  Besides, if anyone could figure out what happened to Jack and Ianto, it was Tosh. 

Having Gwen in that early was just a bonus.

“Think we can turn them back to normal?” Gwen asked, sounding worried.  Owen figured she was just upset because Jack wasn’t around to flirt with her anymore.

“I don’t even know what caused this yet,” Tosh said, irritated.  The action figures were set up at her terminal, and she had all sorts of devices set up to scan the two.  “There wasn’t anything in Jack’s office that could have done it.” She’d looked too, even climbing under the desk to check.

“Something delayed reaction then?” Gwen asked.

Owen stayed silent, mainly because he didn’t want to be the one asking the silly questions.  He’d leave that up to Gwen.

“Could be,” Tosh replied, even more irritated.  “But I hate to theorize without any concrete information.”  She used her keyboard one-handed, without looking, as she punched some buttons on one of her scanners with her other hand.  Her head swiveled back and forth between the device and the main monitor so quickly Owen didn’t know how she didn’t do any soft tissue damage.  “There was a minor Rift spike last night, but nothing was logged into the system.  Ianto always logs things in, so I’d say this happened before he got the chance.”

“But there wasn’t anything in Jack’s office that could have done this?” Gwen asked fretfully.

“I said that, didn’t I?”  Tosh had gone from irritated at the inane questioning, and into being thoroughly engrossed in what she was doing.  “Owen, have you used the deep tissue scanner to see if they’re…you know, still alive?”

“They’re plastic, Tosh,” the medic answered.  “There’s nothing living there.”

He suddenly realized that he couldn’t help but watch the technical genius working over the action figures that had once been their teammates.   It was some serious multitasking, and it was drop dead sexy.

Toshiko Sato was scary.  She was also brilliant.  In his heart Owen adored both sides of her; not that he’d ever admit it.  She was way too good for him.

“You have a point.”  Tosh went back to one of her scanners, frowning at the results.  “They’re terrestrial polymers…nothing alien at all.”

“That’s good…right?” Gwen asked.  She went to pick up the Jack action figure, but Tosh smacked her hand away.

“No,” the Japanese woman answered.  “If they were alien, I might have been able to track down the race that made whatever tech did this.  As it is…” A sudden, wicked smile crossed her face.  “They can be our plastic pals who’re fun to be with.”  She said it with a sing-song cadence.

Owen was glad in that moment that he wasn’t drinking coffee, because he’d have spit it all over the place.  “You’ve read “Hitchhikers” too many times, Tosh.”

“What?” Gwen looked confused by the reference.

Should’ve known she wouldn’t get it.  Owen didn’t feel like enlightening her, because confused Gwen was fun Gwen.   He still laughed when he remembered the time he’d told her that UNIT stood for ‘Undulating Naked Itty-bitty Titties’.

“You need to read more,” Tosh replied absently, her attention suddenly on one of her monitors, reading what it was showing her.  Owen couldn’t even keep up with rolling lines of information, let alone figure out what it was telling her.

He was just realizing that he shouldn’t be watching, because all that data was giving him a headache, when a clatter yanked his attention away.  Owen’s head snapped around – not helping the incipient headache at all – to see Gwen kneeling, her hands scrabbling for something on the floor.

Then he saw what it was she was looking for.

“Bloody hell, Cooper!” he shouted.  “You broke Jack’s arm off!”

“I just wanted to see if I could…I don’t know…” Gwen whined, fussing with the action figure as she stood back up.

Owen snatched it from her.  “Jesus, let me see that!”  He took one look at the damaged figure, seeing that the arm had just popped out of the joint, and rammed it back in, not taking any care as long as Jack was back together.  “I can’t believe you broke Jack!”

“It’ll be fine,” Gwen defended, “he’ll just heal back.”

Owen rolled his eyes.  “He’s fucking plastic!  How can he heal his arm back if Jack’s been turned to fucking plastic?”

“Besides,” Tosh put in, “we don’t hurt Jack.  He has a tendency to get pissed off when we do.”

“And that’s not counting Tea Boy’s reaction,” Owen added.  “I personally don’t want to be on decaf for the rest of my life.”

“We don’t even know if they can feel anything,” Gwen argued.  “Or if they know what’s going on.”

“But we don’t know any different, Gwen,” Tosh said.  “Now, let me get back to work.  The sooner we get them changed back, the better I’ll feel.”

“What if we can’t get them back to normal?”  Gwen had the Doe-Eyes of DoomTM working overtime.  

“Then,” Owen answered, “we buy them a nice dollhouse and some plastic friends to hang out with.”

“I…understand there’s some nice play sets out there,” Tosh murmured, going back to work.

“There are!” Gwen enthused.  “There are houses, and stables – they could go horse riding!  And there are some wonderful outfits, although Ianto might not approve being dressed up, I suppose.  Oh!  We can get Ianto a cute little apron and a vacuum, and maybe his own doll-sized coffee machine…but Jack doesn’t have his coat on, we’ll have to find one like it.  We can get other dolls, too.  Make up a toy Torchwood – “

Owen was about to tell her to shut up, because he really didn't want to know how she knew all that, when the cog door alarm sounded.  All three of them turned toward it in surprise, since everyone was accounted for…

And Jack and Ianto walked in, Ianto carrying a box of what looked suspiciously like pastries.

“Jack!” Gwen shouted, running forward and throwing her arms around Jack, hugging him.

Jack glanced at Owen and Tosh; he must have seen something in their faces – because, let’s face it, they’d been thinking the pair had been turned into plastic action figures all morning – then disengaged himself from Gwen’s grasp.  “Okay,” he said, “I give up.  What’s going on?”

“Bloody hell, Harkness!” Owen swore.  “We thought you and the Tea Boy had gotten zapped by something!”  He was pissed off; they’d been wasting the entire morning thinking something had happened to both of them, and they just walk into the Hub as if they owned the place!

Jack glanced at Ianto, and judging by the confusion on the Welshman’s face, the captain wasn’t going to get any answers from him.  “Forgive me for sounding like a parrot…but zapped?”

“We thought you’d been turned into plastic action figures,” Tosh answered, looking very embarrassed.

The two men came forward, Jack picking up the Jack action figure.  “These?  They came through the Rift last night.  Ianto figures they’re from some parallel dimension where we’re some sort of media heroes.”

“But Ianto usually logs in everything that comes in,” the tech said.

Ianto blushed slightly.  “I was…a bit distracted last night.  I figured it could wait til this morning.”

“Besides,” Jack grinned, “Ianto was a little embarrassed about being anyone’s hero.”  He wrapped an arm around the younger man.  “He’s my hero, anyway,” he added quietly, gazing at Ianto warmly.

“Oh please,” Owen groused, feeling somewhat sick to his stomach.  “That’s disgustingly sappy.  Go and do that somewhere else, but leave the food, yeah?  And how about some coffee before you two go and gush all over each other?”

Jack laughed.  He scooped up the action figures. “If you three don’t mind, I think I might keep these.  I like the idea of having my own action figure.”

“Only you, Harkness,” Owen snorted.

“And you love me for it.”

“In your dreams!”

“Nope, sorry.  I only dream about one member of this team.  Now, don’t we all have work to do?  And where’s that report you owe me, Owen?”

“I’ll even make you a good coffee,” Ianto promised.

“Yeah thanks.”  He was going to need it, especially the way this day has gone so far.


End file.
